Wind power is considered one of the cleanest, most environmentally friendly energy sources presently available, and wind turbines have gained increased attention in this regard. A modern wind turbine typically includes a tower, a generator, a gearbox, a nacelle, and a rotor including one or more rotor blades. The rotor blades capture kinetic energy from wind using known foil principles and transmit the kinetic energy through rotational energy to turn a shaft coupling the rotor blades to a gearbox, or if a gearbox is not used, directly to the generator. The generator then converts the mechanical energy to electrical energy that may be deployed to a utility grid.
Wind turbine generators and wind farms are typically designed to deliver constant active and reactive power to the utility grid with the delivered power being independent of system frequency. This is accomplished by decoupling the rotor inertia and speed from the grid using fast acting power electronics and controls. Due to increases in wind-farm size and penetration, some utilities are now requiring that wind-farm and wind-turbine controls provide enhanced capabilities such as frequency stabilization.
Conventional synchronous generators naturally respond to frequency disturbances due to the grid coupled rotating inertia and governor controls of such generators. Some utility operators require that wind turbines respond in a similar way to frequency disturbances. Specifically, a short duration power increase (for example, five or ten percent of rated power) may be needed when frequency dips below a certain threshold.
It is a well-known characteristic of utility systems that the grid frequency tends to decrease when the load exceeds the generation and to increase when the generation exceeds the load. Such decreases or increases may occur in a monotonic manner, an oscillating manner, or combinations thereof when the grid is subjected to a sudden change in the balance between generation and load. It is a consideration in the design of such a system that any method to achieve compensation of such decreases or increases should be one that does not cause unacceptable coupling between grid oscillatory modes and the wind turbine mechanical oscillatory modes.
Modern wind farms include the capability to curtail output power below the level available based on wind conditions. Utility grid operators sometimes require curtailment if the available grid power is not needed by the utility. Continuous curtailment may also be required by utility operators to provide an operating range for the wind farm to increase power output when frequency decreases.
Thus, as grid requirements continue to change, wind turbine power systems are continuously in need of being able to meet such requirements. Accordingly, the present disclosure is directed to systems and methods for controlling a wind turbine connected to a power grid that activates a predefined control scheme in response to a frequency drop in the power grid in order to the grid requirements thereof.